The Department of Homeland Security revealed Tuesday that the threat of “fake families” declaring asylum together at the United States’ southern border is no joke; more than 150 illegal immigrant “families” have used non-familial children or adults to attempt to convince border patrol agents to allow them to remain in the country.

The Daily Caller reports that “there has been a 110 percent increase in male adults showing up at the border with children. Further, DHS separated 507 illegal immigrants between April 19 and September 30 because they fraudulently claimed they were part of a family unit.”

Customs and Border Patrol separated 170 “families” for being unable to prove any family relationship. In 139 of those cases, children were removed from the custody of unfamiliar adults. In other cases, “families” were separated after Border Patrol agents discovered that a person claiming to be a child was actually older than 18.

DHS blames the rise squarely on the Flores case, a Clinton-era court ruling which prevents illegal immigrant children from being held in custody while they await an asylum hearing, allowing children and their parents to, instead, remain in a residential setting inside the U.S. until they’re up for assessment.- READ MORE